Long Beans

We were at the Davis farmers market this weekend and found this brilliant bundle of green tendrils, straight out of a child's nightmare. I absolutely had to cook it. I did some research when we got home and it looks like these are fairly common in Chinese cooking. They are similar in taste to green beans, but have more crisp texture. I decided to just kinda wing it, combine all the flavors I enjoy in Chinese cooking and go from there.

1 bunch long beans

1 inch minced ginger

3 minced garlic cloves

3-4 small red chili peppers (sub 1 tablespoonful crushed red peppers if need be)

olive oil

sesame seed oil

soy sauce

salt 

pepper

I started by washing and drying the beans, then cutting the tops and bottoms off, just about an inch. Next I cut them into 4-6 inch long segements to make for easier cooking and eating, but if you are more adventurous they can be cooked whole pretty easily. I also chopped and minced the garlic, ginger, and peppers.

Next heat a wok over medium high heat and add a tablespoon of oil. Once the oil is heated, add the beans and cook for 4 minutes, stirring frequently. Once the beans turn brighter green and start looking more cooked, add the ginger, garlic, and pepper.

 Cook and stir constantly for 2 minutes, then remove the beans to a plate. You should have something like the photo below left in the pan. 

Reduce heat to medium low, and add a half teaspoon of sesame seed oil and two tablespoons of soy sauce. Let cook for 40 seconds or so, just until everything smells amazing, then pour the sauce over the beans.

Bruschetta

I've recently decided that I am going to be posting here every Thursday, feel free to give me shit on your preferred social network when I inevitably mug it all up. What this mostly means from a practical standpoint is you will be  seeing more shitty, simple recipes and substantially more rambling, grammatically disgusting posts. As a personal favor to you, I'm going to make the instructions purple so they will stand out and leave the rambling stuff normal, so you can just skip it if you actually want to cook (you're welcome)  So, you know, look out for that.

1 pound good tomatoes
2 cloves garlic
1/2 bunch fresh basil
1 baguette
balsamic vinegar
salt
pepper
olive oil

Lets start with the tomatoes because those are really the easiest part to completely fuck up. The rest of this recipe is just chopping and waiting really.  My dear, close, and personal friend Caitlin gave ME (not Shannon) two of those hanging upside down tomato planters at the beginning of summer. As much as it thrills me to get completely unsolicited gifts from dear, close, personal friends, I really couldn't make heads or tails of the gift, but accepted graciously and watered diligently. After several months we harvested three emaciated, scarred tomatoes. They really were quiet ugly, especially after years of pretty much exclusively eating perfect deep red spheres. We didn't want to just toss them in a sauce, so we whipped up a quick batch of bruschetta. At the first bite Shannon nearly hit the floor. The flavor! By god we had forgotten what tomatoes are supposed to taste like! For all intents and purposes we had been eating red water balloons for months if not years and calling them tomatoes. This deeply disturbed me and I have since gone out of my way to but those stupid expensive local heirloom tomatoes at the co-op. I know, I know! Four dollars for a pound of tomatoes! It can't be that good! It is, you have to trust me, it really really is. Thanks again Caitlin.

To summarize all that, BUY GOOD TOMATOES THE DAY YOU ARE MAKING THIS. Not the Sunday before, or the night before, the day of. No exceptions.

Preheat oven to 350ish. Chop into 1/2 cubes, or smaller if you prefer.Place in a reasonably large vessel.

Next is the basil, but really the chopping can be done in any order. I like to chiffonade the basil, it results in long pretty strips. To chiffonade, stack the leaves on top of each other,

 then roll them up,

 and cut.

 Next mince the garlic and add that to the bowl. Top with a 1 to 4 ratio of balsamic vinegar to olive oil, you can fill in the measurements depending on if you like yours more or less saucy. Top with a two healthy pinches of salt and a few cracks of pepper. Refrigerate for about a half hour while you prep the bread.

Slice 8-12 pieces of bread, about 1/2 inch thick. Arrange on a baking sheet and coat with olive oil. If you have a fancy brush, congratulations you have a better stocked kitchen than me, I bet your mother is proud. If you don't have a fancy brush, I know that feel bro, just spread the oil with your finger and be sure to wash first. Toss the oiled bread in the oven for five minutes, then turn on the oven light and stare at it until its perfect. Could be six minutes, could be eight. I know its not less than five, but other than that its your damn business to make sure you don't mug it up. I don't have to eat your burnt ass bread so whatever, that's on you son.

 Let the bread cool slightly on the counter while you stir the bruschetta, then top each piece with a spoonful of the mixture.  Personally, I go heavier on the oil and vinegar, then I use a fork to put the bruschetta on the bread. Once I scoop all the tomatoes out, this leaves me with about a cup of really good salad dressing base.  This recipe and its amounts should get you through most of a loaf, depending on how you roll, and the bruschetta should be good until.... gosh I don't know, lets say until the loaf of bread goes bad. That sounds good

Garlic Scapes Pesto

This weekend I picked up these odd, snake-like greens at the farmer's market here in Davis with absolutely no idea what I was going to do with them. After a quick Google search for "Garlic Scapes" I learned that they are the curly shoots of the garlic plant that have a more mild garlic taste. After tasting a piece raw I would say its about 1/4 the strength of regular garlic, if you would like to try using it as a substitution. It looked like pesto was the most popular recipe. I decided to try my hand at one. All of the ingredients listed below are close approximations at best. Pesto requires a light hand and frequent tastings to get right.

1 bunch garlic scapes
1/4 cup pine nuts
1/3 cup hard cheese grated
1/2 cup olive oil
5 basil leaves
salt and pepper


I started by loosely chopping the scapes. When chopping basil for a pesto I usually go for speed over uniformity because the blender does a solid job of sorting out the details. In this particular case, however, the scapes are very fiberous. You need to cut them down to at least a quarter inch, ideally smaller, or else you will have long fibers in the pesto and that can get stuck in your teeth and be miserable.

You can chop the pine nuts at this point if you prefer your pesto more smooth, I personally don't.
Add 3/4ths of the scapes and oil into the blender and pulse until it reaches your prefered texture. Add the cheese, basil, pine nuts, salt and pepper, reserving about a quarter of each for fine tuning. Pulse for three seconds to combine, then taste. Tastes too much like garlic? Add more basil. Too nutty? Add more scapes, salt and pepper. Too sweet? add more pine nuts. Tune the pesto to yours and your guests' tastes.

We served this spread on toasted bread slices and it was lovely. I  could also see it working very well as a base for a simple pasta sauce or even adding something unexpected to a salsa. Enjoy!